The present invention relates to a labeling machine for articles like bottles and consisting of an intake star, a take-out star, and a turntable positioned between them and having distributed around its circumference several accommodations in which the article is secured between a rotating plate and a rotating head while it is transported alongside a labeling station and alongside label applicators or contactors, whereby a rotary drive mechanism with an invariable program, supplied in particular by a stationary cam, is provided to rotate the rotating plate and head during transport through the bottle holder and controls with a sensor that detects an indication on the circumference of the article are provided to orient the articles in a rotated position and control the rotary drive mechanism independently of the invariable program in such a way that the article is rotated into a desired initial orientation before it arrives in the vicinity of the labeling station.
Labeling machines of this type are known. They are intended for applying labels to bottles in a particular orientation to an indication on the article. The stoppers themselves are utilized as the indications that are detected by the sensor in one known labeling machine of the aforesaid type that is intended for patent-stoppered bottles. The advantage of a labeling machine of this type, in which the article is oriented while it is in the bottle holder in which the bottles are suplied secured between a rotating plate and a rotating head to the labeling station, over a labeling machine in which the article is oriented while it is in an intake star or intermediate star upstream of the bottle holder is that a potential source of undesired rotation subsequent to orientation and during transfer from the intake star to the bottle holder is eliminated. There is, however, a drawback to this type of machine in that it can orient only bottles with patent stoppers because the stoppers are exploited as positive mechanical stops. The system is not applicable to articles that have indications that are strictly optical, electromagnetic, or detectable by similar means (as in prior German Patent application No. P 32 44 485.0-27, not yet opened for inspection).
In addition to the drawback that only bottles with mechanically detectable indications can be oriented, there can be another in that a coupling, a friction clutch for example, must be introduced into the sequence to deactivate the torque delivered by the stationary cam to the rotating plate when the article has been oriented as desired.